Lyrical son of Lyari

THE poetry collection of a Lyari-born poet, Shafiq Khalish, now based in Washington, was launched at the Pakistan Arts Council on Sunday.

It was a pleasant experience to hear Prof Murad Afghani and the poet’s family talk about the background of the collection, Naqsh-i-Paa.

Noted writer Mazhar Jamil presided over the proceedings, and among those who spoke about the person and poetry of Shafiq Khalish included Hussain Anjum, Saifur Rehman Grami, Muslim Shamim, Prof Sahar Ansari and Saba Ikram.

We learnt from the speakers that Shafiq Khalish’s grandfather had come to Karachi from Afghanistan and settled in Lyari around 150 years ago. He was a learned person devoted to reading and collecting books. He was among the founders of a library, Afghan Union, in 1932. Khalish’s family, basically Persian-speaking, is also fluent in Sindhi and Urdu and knows Kashmiri, due to its relationships with different communities. This has given the poet a catholic outlook.

Wanting to see the world, Khalish had joined a shipping company in his early youth, visited many places, landed in North America, got employed at various places and has been living in Washington for the past 17 years. His fondness for Urdu and his birthplace Karachi ignited in him a love for writing poetry.

Naqshi-i-Paa has ghazals and verses written in simple Urdu, “sweetened by Persian”, according to Hussain Anjum. A poem on Baghdad reflects the poet’s grief at and concern for the Muslim world. A poem in praise of Nelson Mandela speaks about his devotion to freedom and human rights. Referring to the Persianized diction used by Khalish in his poetry, Grami said that Urdu had no future without Persian.

Mazhar Jamil said that Sindh was richly endowed with libraries and publishing houses, some dating back three centuries, and quoted the noted historian Dr Nabi Bakhsh Baloch as saying that manuscripts by many Urdu poets had been discovered in the region.

POETRY deals with the inner self, with emotions and aesthetical experiences. As against this, the physical sciences are related to the hard facts of this material world. But at some point, both physics and metaphysics happen to meet in a spirit of co-existence.

This was the burden of the discussion at a meeting of the Bazm-i-Scienci Adab last week.

The organizers of the forum are persons with a scientific background but with literary leanings. They believe that literature, particularly poetry, can be an effective medium to popularize scientific thinking among the masses. The Bazm had held its first mushaira in 1993, and the fifth was held in 1999 presided over by an eminent physicist at Birmingham University, Dr Saeed Akhtar Durrani, who has undertaken research work on Allama Iqbal. In between, the Bazm has continued to hold monthly meetings.

At last week’s meeting, Dr Mohammad Ali Siddiqui was the main speaker, Dr Waris Kidwai, a cardiologist, read out a paper based on his professional experience and concluded that many elderly persons in our midst society were not always heart patients but victims of their family’s and society’s indifference. Valuable papers came from Shahab Zafar and Sohail Yusuf based on the journalistic reporting of scientific material. They pleaded for bridging the communication gap between scientists and journalists for the development of both science and society.

ZAHEER Akhtar Bedri, a story writer and newspaper columnist, read out one of his stories at Irtiqa’s literary sitting on Sunday.

Jamal Naqvi, secretary of the Irteqa Adbi Forum, introduced Bedri as a realist close to the lives of the common people. He referred to the special number of Bedri’s monthly Farda on Shaukat Siddiqui.

Rauf Niazi and Shafique Ahmed Shafique were critical of Bedri’s stories, which they said lacked artistic qualities. The story discussed, they said, failed to meet the demands of realism. Their criticism was scathing, but Noor Mohammad Shaikh and Razzaq Maikash supported the writer in his concern for the underprivileged, the marginalized and the neglected.

Jamal Naqvi quoted Karl Marx as having said that philosophers had seen the world in their own ways, but the writers through their writings introduced a process of change in the shaping of the world.

Hasan Abid, who was in the chair, was of the opinion that a balanced view should be taken while evaluating literary works. Every writer was not expected to be a perfectionist and only sympathetic criticism could bring about a change for the better.

THE annual ‘kutub mela’ is in progress at the Welcome Book Port. Poet Shabnam Shakil visited the mela last week and admired the collection of books on popular subjects.

Confronting the enigma of global warming

LONDON: Climate change is one of mankind’s greatest challenges. In the past 30 years world temperatures have increased by almost 0.5C. We cannot predict with certainty what will happen now, but the risk of abrupt climate change certainly exists. Human activity is increasing the concentration of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to levels unprecedented in human history. If we do nothing, or next to nothing, those levels will continue to rise, progressively increasing the risk of runaway global warming.

There are those who say the risks have been exaggerated. To such people I say this: if we go your way and you are wrong we will save money in the short term but incur an immense penalty in the long term; if we go my way and I am wrong we will incur costs in the short term but with the reward of greener, cleaner technologies for saving and generating energy. Such technologies would improve air quality, avoid acid rain and reduce our dependency on imported gas and oil.

It would seem that the Bush administration and for many years the US Senate do not accept this logic: America will not sign up to the Kyoto protocol; but we should not presume that American action on climate change begins and ends in Washington. California has shown how governments can encourage the development of breakthrough technologies such as hybrid electric cars and has pursued far-sighted policies. Across America, over 150 local governments, representing more than 50 million people, have in effect signed up to the Kyoto protocol - pledging to reduce carbon emissions by more than most European countries.

The American people have shown that not being a signatory need not stop one from making progress on climate change. Sadly, Tony Blair has proven the corollary: being a signatory does not guarantee progress. If Britain achieves its Kyoto commitments it will be for two reasons: the legacy of the Conservative-led dash for gas in the 1990s and reduced emissions of minor greenhouse gases due to one-off improvements to industrial plant. But emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, have been going up under Labour. They are now higher than when they took office in 1997. Indeed, not only will Labour fail miserably on their target for a 20 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2010, they may even miss Britain’s Kyoto target too.

Thus Mr Blair is in a weak position to lecture Mr Bush. He has not restored Britain’s position of world leadership because he has not led by example. This is in contrast to the Conservative record. Starting with Margaret Thatcher, Conservative ministers were instrumental in raising the issue of climate change. Our words rang clear, not just because they were backed by science but also because they were backed by action that reduced UK emissions.

That credibility proved crucial in 1992, when, as environment secretary, it fell to me to persuade the US government to attend the Rio summit and sign the UN framework convention on climate change; in 24 hours of shuttle diplomacy the Americans were persuaded on both counts. This is more than a mere footnote in history: the framework convention provides the basis for the Kyoto protocol and all subsequent agreements.

The Kyoto treaty runs out in 2012. We need to start thinking about a new agreement — one that builds upon positive developments in America, achievements that prove industry will respond if politicians lead.

The future should look something like this: at first, emission reductions should be realistic. If they aren’t, the US, China and India will reject any successor treaty. These economies rely on huge industries that can’t turn themselves around within this decade, but can and must do so in the decades ahead. In the longer term, reductions must become progressively more ambitious.

Furthermore, they must be locked in through binding commitments, stretching decades into the future and reinforced by market-based emissions-trading mechanisms. That would send the clear signal that industry and finance need if they are to invest enough in the new technologies required. And before that governments must do more to support the emergence of those technologies.

This isn’t just about us and the Americans. The sobering fact is that China is building 1,000 megawatts of coal-fired generating capacity every two weeks. Before long India will be doing the same. If we don’t develop the technologies that will enable these emerging giants to generate power cleanly then the war against global warming will be lost.

These days Tony Blair is in Washington. The US is the greatest innovator the world has ever seen. There is no doubt that it can make the most enormous contribution towards dealing with one of the greatest problems the world has ever seen. Britain must persuade America to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service

(The writer is the leader of the Conservative party)